The new Office brand

Last week, we unveiled the new Office. This is our most ambitious release to date. It is a touch-friendly, social release that is at its best on Windows 8 and works wherever you do in the cloud.

As part of this introduction, we also unveiled a new logo and new naming for this modern Office. Such a significant release deserved a fresh look. This post explains the story behind the new logo and the different ways you get the new Office.

The new Office logo represents the doorway to new opportunities. You can think about it as your doorway out of your traditional workplace and into the world – to all the places where the doing gets going.

The new Office helps you get things done from anywhere on your favorite Windows 8 devices, and the new logo embodies this. You’ll probably notice that the new Office logo is highly reminiscent of the new Windows mark and part of a company-wide approach to deliver a more consistent branding experience across all of our products.

However, since you can’t really use a symbol as a name, the name is important too. So what are we naming this new release? Quite simply, we call it “the new Office.”

There are two primary and different ways you can get the new Office:

Office 365. This is our services brand. Office 365 services are subscriptions with multiple installs for different devices and are always the latest technology every day of the year. Last week, we announced an extension of our Office 365 services for consumers – Office 365 Home Premium – and a new option for business users – Office 365 ProPlus, which join our Office 365 services for small businesses, enterprises, education and government.

Office Client – Release Year Editions. Just like a car, these editions are the latest technology up to that year. The new release is the “2013” edition. You’ll see this label in suites such as “Office Home and Student 2013.” These editions are also in the cloud and save to SkyDrive by default, but people buy and install once on a single machine.

Note: Individual client applications such as Word, Excel, Outlook, OneNote and PowerPoint carry a year-model moniker no matter how you get them. If you are a subscriber, the year model edition is updated as part of new updates.

In addition, the Office Web Apps, free browser-based companions to Office, are available to everyone and deliver the best browser-based productivity experience for quick viewing and light editing.

Office has been and continues to be the best tool to get things done, and the new brand identity celebrates “doers”. Strong active verbs reinforce all the great things you can do with Office and echo the confidence or self-assuredness people told us they feel when Office is their partner helping them get things done.

Simply put, the new brand is designed to amplify the key investments in the new Office.

Stay tuned to this blog and Office Next for more information in coming weeks and months. For now, visit our Pressroom for more information, and don’t forget to download the preview of the new Office yourself.